In UK, as, apparently, in Zild, we have recently adopted the Year n system, year 1 being when you first start and going on to year 12 (or something!) As a rule of thumb, you can work out the age of the children in any given year by adding 5 to it (e.g., year 9 is inhabited by 9 5=14 year-olds)

I never found Python remotely humorous in HS. There were a lot of smart guys who loved it and would recite line after line for hours by heart. It's not that I didn't understand the humor. I just didn't think it was funny.

Completely by accident, I was listening to the Cheeseshop skit on record. I had an uncontrollable fit of laughter. Amongst the funniest things I've ever heard and I at times when others might be inclined to shout "where's the beef," will often mutter "not much of a cheeseshop, is it?" or "well, it's certainly uncontaminated by XYZ." But the reference is usually lost on the audience.

There are people who seriously claim that our school standards are not declining - that all the hullabaloo is really a plot to undermine public education.

For an interesting personal account with an education system outside the US, read Maxim Gorky's recollections of conversations with Chekhov at http://www.imagi-nation.com/moonstruck/clsc6w4.html - Note that Chekhov feels shame that teachers make so little money and have to be timid and dress so shabbily. It's really a worthwhile read.

I do think that comparatively speaking, most of my foreign friends have been better educated than most of my american born friends. OTOH, the process of getting over here from over there is often highly selective.

One of my very best friends is Greek and we discuss education often. He's a bright guy, trained in computer science as I am, but his major interest is in history. He reads ancient Greek as well as modern. I shared with him my view that education is distinct from schooling. Schooling, I insist is roughly what gets done to you, while education is what you do for yourself. Education and Schooling interfere with each other, sometimes constructively and sometimes destructively. Long before I had read of Mark Twain's experience, I had come to the conclusion that one of the primary responsibilities of a person who wanted to learn was to avoid letting his schooling interfere with his education. Schools (and public institutions of 'education') concentrate on schooling and confuse their mission as one of education.

However, my friend, who attended college and a few years of K-12 in the US and the rest in Greece, disagrees. He doubts my observation is a fact. And, if it is a fact, it is pecular to the US and he asserts that in Greece (and possibly the rest of Europe) schooling is much closer to what I would consider an education.

I understand well that others will consider my distinction to be contrived or perhaps cavilling. But in my mind it's what distinguishes understanding from a sterile collection of facts and rules. For a sample of the distinction I'm trying to make, I refer interested parties to the passage in Werner Heisenberg's "Uncertainty and Beyond" in which he discusses a conversation he had with other boys while they were on a hike. It's the dialog, the hashing back and forth, that differentiates. Sometimes it's an inner dialog, and that might be sufficient for some people at some times, but also it's the exterior dialog, the conversation with others, outside the classroom, outside the pressure, the asking for knowing's sake alone that plants the seed, that sparks the flint, that entices the novitiate to tread her first intrepid step onto her chosen path despite the scarcity of breadcrumbs.

I wrote an essay some five or six years ago in which I chronicle from a self-centered and largely uninformed perspective a few highlights of my own schooling. It's a bit hokey at parts, self-congratulatory, and probably a bit more mean-spirited than what I would write today. Still, it will serve as an introduction, and provide context to explain, without pardon, my predilection for expressing eccentric opinions.

For those who prefer the short version to meandering, sesquipedalian tripe, it can be summarized by saying that the bad teachers are seriously crappy and deserve to be horse-whipped and dipped in boiling acid, while the good teachers should be put on pedestals and worshipped as gods.

So here's my own footnote to The Conversation.

-------------

I was pretty pleased with education in DoDDsschools and pretty annoyed by the experiencesin the civilian schools. I never thought theDoDDs schools were all that much into tellingus what to do and when. My recollection isI had more freedom there and less harrassmentthan any other place.

I never cared for most of my teachers. I hada few really good ones and a lot of crappyones. I did, however, later come to realizethat some of the ones I didn't like all thatmuch were really pretty good, but I wasn'tsmart enough to figure that out till it wastoo late.

In fact, I had some really sorry teachers andthanks to them I have a lasting loathing andgeneral mistrust for teachers in general--but the great ones, well ... it's hard toput into words what I feel about them. A singleword perhaps - cherish?

I attended numerous schools. My parents movedaround and I went to several in differentplaces. I came from Louisville, KYoriginally. Then we moved to New Hampshire.The teachers treated me like I was retarded.I couldn't do anything. All I can rememberreally (besides getting beaten up,humiliated, and continually rebuked)is that I was always - ALWAYS -unhappy. I failed the second grade. In 3rd,whenever they did math, they would take meout of class and walk me to the other end ofthe building to take math with the firstgraders. At the time I really hated this, butit might have been for the best in the longrun. By the 4th grade, we had moved back toKY and I had begun to teach myself therudiments of algebra. Those early teachers -well, they didn't seem to really understandwhat they were teaching, even in retrospect.But the thing I really hated about them wasthe fact that they were liars. Theybrainwashed you into not protecting yourself."If someone tries to fight, don't do it. Comeget us." Well, I did, and then they promptlydid nothing. I was getting beaten up everysingle day in school until one day I broughta knife in and shoved it in a guy's face. Thebeatings stopped. I was still miserable. Ibegan to eradicate every nuance of 'southernspeak' from my habits of speech. It was badenough that the kids at school were makingfun of me without the teachers giving me 'thetone' every time I opened my mouth.

My first really good teacher was Mr. Devinein the 5th grade. He mostly just gave us SRAsand these block thingies with papers kindalike SRAs. Each paper had 3 views of anobject constructed from the blocks and youhad to make the object. I loved it. I was inthe advanced reading group already. I testedat 12th grade reading level. I began torealize I wasn't so stupid after all.

Mrs. Clarke, 7th grade math. When I took herclass, I thought I only learned 2 things:canceling fractions and something else I'veforgotten. Later, I realized the gift shegave me. Every morning, first thing, we woulddo math drills. As a result I've never metanyone who could do simple math quicker thanI could. Interesting sidenote: once in anassembler (computer science) class, therewere only two 100s on the test. Both werefrom people who didn't use calculators!

Mrs Rich, 8th grade math. Let me start onalgebra with two other kids in the back ofthe room. We were 'together' in the back ofthe room, but we never talked to each otherand we each worked independently. Wentthrough the whole book by myself. Worked atmy own pace. This was great.

Mr. Dewitt, 9th grade geometry. Taught theclass without a book. (They were locked instorage just a few miles from the school!!)Was really off the wall. If we didn't want towork on a day, he would cancel class andwe'd talk about anything we wanted. But wewere all pretty highly motivated andinterested. He was also very accepting ofnovel approaches to problems. No. That's anunderstatement. Actually he was veryencouraging of them.

Mr. Sipes from 9th to 12th grade in h.s.:algebra II, computer math, trig, analyticgeometry, calculus. This guy was just plaingreat. Interesting, intelligent, verypatient. Really tried to get in your mind andunderstand how you were thinking...didn'tjust say, "Well, you're wrong." but wouldhelp you understand exactly where you wentoff track. Patient, PATIENT man.

Mr. Hockensmith, 10th and 11th grade...latinI and II. "Bis dat qui cito dat." (He givestwice who gives quickly.) "Qui docet,discet." (He who teaches learns.) Anotheramazing teacher. Very gruff sounding man, buta regular softie. He really had a knack forbringing everything together. Frankly, Icould do English, but I never reallyunderstood my own language's grammar till I studiedLatin under him. He talked about History,Culture, Latin in a way that brought thingsto life for me. I don't remember much fromthose years - vocabulary, grammar, history,unused and long forgotten, but I still likereciting sometimes, vestigial memories,"Nox erat, et terris animaliasomnus habebat." (It was night and sleeppossessed the animals of the forest -- FromVergil's Aeneiad) and "Quo usque tandemabutere Catalina patienta nostra?" (How long,Cataline, will you continue to try ourpatience? From Cicero's orations againstCataline.)

Mrs. Speck, 12th grade honors reading (a 6 wkcourse). She let us read just about anythingwe wanted to. There were three lists. Youhadda pick two books from each list to readthrough the course. You could pick all sixbooks from the last list, if you wanted, butthen you couldn't go back to the easierlists. If you wanted to read something thatwasn't on the lists, you could tell her andshe would tell you which list it would applyto. Before this class it didn't much occur tome that I would actually like reading stuffthat wasn't either science or sciencefiction.

Mrs. Schlinker - here's one I didn'tappreciate until it was far too late. Oldschool. Very old school. But she made usthink about what we were saying - not justwhat we thought we were saying, but what wewere actually saying. If there's one teacherI could go back and apologize to for havingbeen a jackass, she's the one.

Coming out of high school, my father sat medown at the table and told me to give up anyhope of going to college. There was just noway this was going to happen. I would have toget a job instead. Meanwhile I earned apresidential and a congressional appointmentto West Point. I went for a short while andthen decided I didn't care for the military.Left, came back to Louisville and got amaster's at the local engineering school.

My degree was in Engineering Math and ComputerScience but I lazed around and studied lots ofthings and didn't concentrate only on neuralnets and the like, but also on philosophy, sociology,history, psychology. I was interested ineverything. Won a few awards throughout myschool career: first place latin translation,first place latin poetry, second place in adebate contest and 2nd in a poetry contest,6th highest score in the state on the nationalmath exam, distinguished student award in college.

I'm moderately amused by my earliest recollectionsfrom school when it was very clear the teachersconsidered me a mentally retarded trouble-maker.Fortunately, I eventually had some outstandingteachers, most of whom I've listed above.

Every hope I had that I could succeed, I oweto these gems. Some people are bedecked inrubies and topaz and saphire, gold chains orsilver bracelets. Everywhere I go I too amadorned, not around my neck or wrist orcrown, but around my soul, by precious jewelsbearing names like Mrs. Rich and Mr. Sipes andMr. Devine.

Thatís a very moving personal account, and a salutary reminder of the difference a special teacher can make to a young mind. Thanks for sharing those thoughts.

fwiw, I agree with your general premise about the difference between schooling and education in a way - but perhaps it all boils down to the vital requirement of motivation. And as you rightly say, a sensitive mentor can help you light your own spark for subjects that might elude you otherwise.

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